I’d like to point out Mike Sigers’ post titled “Can a Salesman Learn to Pitch?” on his Simplenomics blog.

In this post, Mike recounts a story of a salesman who learned how to sell by studying baseball great Carl Hubbell, the inventor of the screwball. The main reason for my wanting to point this post out is to show how someone can strengthen their sales abilities but studying clients/prospects before trying to sell to them. Of course, every good salesperson should do that but many don’t.

The other reason, and a slightly selfish reason, is that I love to see Carl Hubbell’s name. You see…I’m from the same small town (Meeker OK) that Carl grew up in and have always known about ‘King Carl’ and his great career as a pitcher. His appearance in the 1934 All Star game is still legendary…he struck out five of the best hitters of the era in succession: Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Al Simmons and Joe Cronin.

If you ever visit Meeker and drive through the town on Highway 62 (the east/west road), you’ll see City Hall and the “Carl Hubbell Museum“. Nothing fancy here…just a one story metal building that houses the police, volunteer fire, city hall and a small area with all of Carl Hubbell’s memorabilia that he and his family donated. Note: If you drive through town on Highway 18 (the north/south road), you’ll miss most everything…except for the blinking stoplight and the corner gas station. Yes…the town is that small…the last census showed 996 people in town.

Long live King Carl and the Screwball.

[tags] Carl Hubbell, Screwball, King Carl, Meeker, Oklahoma [/tags]